Sri Lanka – USA Business Council (SLUSABC) which functions under the aegis of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce held its 05^th Annual General Meeting on 22^nd July 2021, electing Sanji de Silva, CEO, Bileeta (Pvt) Ltd as the President of the SLUSABC for 2021/2022.

Her Excellency Alaina B. Teplitz, the Ambassador of the United States of America to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, while congratulating the new committee said, “Building on the shared values and strategic interests and the abiding friendship between our people, my team and I have worked with many partners, the Sri Lanka - USA Business Council among them, to increase Sri Lanka’s capacity to foster sustainable and inclusive economic growth, to counter terrorism and transnational crime and to promote the rule of law, transparency and democratic governance. The Ambassador went on to encourage that “one of my top priorities, as it’s going to be for my successor, is to increase opportunities for U.S. firms to engage in Sri Lanka, echoing some of the themes I raised earlier.  And whether it’s to export goods or services, [inaudible] with government tenders or make investments and have joint ventures with partners here, we’re ready to be there”.

“The United States remains Sri Lanka’s largest single country export market so our contributions to Sri Lankan prosperity are in this regard unparalleled.  We’ve also committed significant resources to the U.S. Development Finance Corporation, the U.S. Trade Development Agency, USAID and other agencies to promote infrastructure and human capital development in Sri Lanka and throughout the Indo-Pacific region. Just this year the Development Finance Corporation, or DFC, committed $265 million in financing to private Sri Lankan banks to ensure small businesses could access the capital to grow their vision.  This kind of financial assistance often contributes more to long term sustainable development than more high profile and economically dubious infrastructure projects.  Importantly, this approach also puts Sri Lankans in the driver’s seat” she said.

Outgoing President of the Council, Dr Asanka Ratnayake mentioned that, “Despite these challenging environments, we arranged meetings with relevant stake holders: namely USAID, BOI and EDB to determine the activities that should be carried out by the Council. As an outcome, the Council intends to carry out a project focusing on Agri Supply Chain and business matchmaking targeting the Vegan Meat products to the US market. We feel this is a sector where there is greater demand for Sri Lankan companies to explore”.

Sanji de Silva, addressing the membership after his election stated that “We have identified that there’s a growing demand for Vegan products in USA and in Sri Lanka we have a good supplier base for these products. However, the supply chain can be further streamlined with the use of Agri Technologies. Then there is a need to have activities to introduce of buyers and suppliers between the countries. Another focus area will be to support the ICT Industry to pursue opportunities between Sri Lanka and USA. We are planning to work with organizations such as SLASSCOM to facilitate ICT related business opportunities between the countries as the post pandemic has created a great demand for ICT”.

The 2021/22 Executive Committee comprises of Charithra Hettiarachchi, CEO, HVA Foods PLC and Randeewa Malalasooriya, CEO, CBL Natural Foods (Pvt) Ltd as Vice Presidents, Tilak Gunawardana, CFO, MAC Holdings (Pvt) Ltd, as the Treasurer and Asanka Ratnayake, Group Director, Hayleys Advantis Ltd, as the Immediate Past President.

Newly appointed committee members include: Indika Kulathunga, Dipped Products PLC; Farhath Armith, Fanam International (Pvt) Ltd; Sanjaya Samararatne, Global Rubber Industries (Pvt) Ltd; Revanke de Silva, Heritage Teas (Pvt) Ltd and Shane Perera, Regency Teas (Pvt) Ltd.

The Annual General Meeting was followed by a panel discussion on Post Pandemic Trading with USA. The panel include: Suresh Silva, Chairman, Coconut Milk Producers Association; Sarada De Silva, Founder Chairman of Spice Council of Sri Lanka; Suresh de Mel, Chairman EDB; Jagath Fernando, Vice Chairman, Fruit and Vegetable Producers, Processors and Exporters Association and moderated by Charithra Hettiarachchi, Vice President SLUSABC.

Speaking during the event, Export Development Board Chairman Suresh De Mel, encouraged exporters to remit earnings to the country and provided assurance to exporters and investors they could still obtain and utilize foreign financing for projects in the country. He identified the need to amend policies to strengthen Sri Lanka’s capital controls and enhance export potential and invited the private sector to work closer with government to formulate this process. The inclusion and engagement of the public, the private sector and investment agencies is critical for this process the participants noted, also to boost credibility, relevance and sustainability of such policy.

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